Aquila

Prologue

The ancient metal halls of the old bunker dripped with condensation and let drops of water hit the ground in rhythmic tones, each drop echoing in concert with another and filling the entire empty space with a chorus of sound. The silence that permeated the space around the dripping water was ruptured by the sound of boots echoing in the darkness. The inky blackness was punctured by the light from several electric torches that cut through the blackness in slow swings, hitting the rusted old walls and painting the world in color for brief moments in time. The squad of guardsmen that were grouped together, looking around in the cone of lights produced by the torches, weren't sure what it was that they were supposed to find. The cacophony of sounds that echoed loudly from everywhere kept them on constant alert, and the newest among them jumped at every single noise that they came across.

"How long do you think this stuff has been here?" One of them asked as she looked up at the ceiling that was pockmarked with rust and the occasional vent. "It looks ancient..."

"I don't know why Halbrecht even wants us here," another complained as he tripped over a raised floor panel, swearing angrily as he caught himself before he fell. "This place is a dump!"

"A dump that is likely filled to the brim with old tech. Wish that tech-priest had stuck around. He'd know what we were looking for," their squad leader spoke next. "Besides, if Governor Halbrecht wants us to scour this place from top to bottom, then that's what we do. So, shut up and keep looking." The wide hallways before them began widening further into a massive atrium where their footsteps echoed off of the immensely high ceiling. Whatever had once been in the massive hall was long gone. "Break off. Search any rooms you find. I want to know what this place was used for. Conroy, take the left. Denis, take the right. Mercer..."

Denis watched as her squadmates all dispersed around the atrium and followed suit, her torch leading her to one door at the far right of the atrium. She pulled it open and found herself faced with a narrow hallway. With a brief glance back over her shoulder, she entered into the dark space, careful to leave the door open behind her as she did for what little good it did. Besides the occasional flash of light from the torches of her fellow squadmates, no light followed her as she crept inside of the room, watching carefully as her feet maneuvered around tangles of old cords and wires that threaded their way along the metal floor. The place was massive, and the metal floor eventually gave way to a grated catwalk that was suspended over a twenty-meter drop. Beneath her, all she could see was massive pipes that stretched on in the dark chasms beyond the reach of her light. She almost tripped down steps on the other side and found herself in a decently sized room. It looked like it had once been a monitoring hub of some kind with old cogitators riddled with dials and rust.

She stepped further into the room and looked around at the empty chairs, strewn about as if the people who had once sat in them had scrambled out in a hurry. She wondered what could have caused their flight as she saw tins for food scattered across the table with rusting silverware. Whoever they were, they had left in quite the hurry to have left so much of their belongings behind. What perplexed her was how little professional items remained. there were no signs of manuals, no cogitator logs resting nearby. Nothing. It was as if the place had been stripped bare of anything that could have told them what this place used to be.

Her mind bitterly remembered the Cadians and the Tech-Priest with that barking Commissar. The Priest had been odd, always twitching and speaking to the machine spirits, coming in with edicts from the Ministratum and Inquisition to take whatever they wanted without asking. Pelamon may have been some backwater jungle shithole, but it was still their home, yet in came those vultures acting like they owned it all. The Adeptus Mechanicus felt entitled to everything she saw before her despite the fact that the Martian vultures had likely never heard of this place until the report got back that this facility, deep under the great lake, she was sure, had been uncovered and pumped clear of water. The moment they heard of it, an Imperial edict marked with the sigil of the Inquisition and stamped by some bigwigs from Terra and Mars deemed that they would not be allowed to touch the place until they had their pick of what was there. Damn the thought that it could assist the people of Pelamon.